In 2022, the United States Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service Eating and Health Module captured the first nationally representative data about how many U.S. residents grocery shop online. The data featured in the Labor Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics’ American Time Use Survey revealed that about one in five shoppers purchased groceries online at least once in the 30 days prior to the survey.
ERS researchers performed an analysis to look at the differences in the likelihood of online grocery shopping within the past month among a wide variety of personal characteristics. The largest disparity among any of these characteristics was the difference in an individual’s education level, from nine percent for those with less than a high school diploma to 26 percent of those with more than a bachelor’s degree. Those with a bachelor’s degree or higher were 17 percentage points more likely to buy groceries online.
